By Ben Meiselas
I watched this morning’s congressional hearings so you don’t have to. Let me breakdown the highlights, or rather, the lowlights, and fill you in on the day’s news.
Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, a central architect of the Trump administration’s sweeping deportation campaign, found herself unable to answer the most basic questions about the human beings whose lives her agency had upended. What followed was one of the most withering examinations of a cabinet official I have ever seen.
Congressman Seth Magaziner, a Democrat from Rhode Island, delivered a prosecutorial master class. His question was simple: how many U.S. military veterans have you deported? Noem insisted her department had not deported veterans, until Magaziner revealed one of those veterans was already on Zoom waiting to speak to her directly.
Checkmate.
There he was, Sae Joon Park, a U.S. Army combat veteran wounded twice in Panama in 1989, a Purple Heart recipient, a man who struggled with PTSD and substance abuse, and who has been clean for 14 years. Earlier this year, Noem’s department deported him to South Korea, a country he had not lived in since he was seven years old. Magaziner asked her to explain why this man, who “sacrificed more for this country than most people ever have,” was expelled from the nation he bled for.
Noem could not answer.
Magaziner then introduced another case: Jim Brown, a Navy combat veteran whose wife Donna was imprisoned and facing deportation despite having lived lawfully in the United States for nearly five decades. Her only offense was writing two bad checks totaling eighty dollars ten years ago. Again, Noem insisted her hands were tied, despite the broad authority DHS holds to grant humanitarian parole and defer deportations on a case by case basis.
Pressed to commit to reviewing these cases, she finally relented with “I will review the case.” But the pattern was already clear. Cruelty was the policy. Denial was the defense.
Representative McIver’s exchange with Noem revealed a different problem. The Secretary repeatedly talked over the members questioning her. McIver asked whether using DHS resources to target members of Congress constituted an abuse of power. Noem insisted it was not happening and said she couldn’t hear the questioning. McIver responded bluntly: “You would have heard me if you stopped talking and listened to my question” The frustration was palpable. The disregard for oversight was even more obvious.
Then came Congressman Dan Goldman, whose questioning forced Noem into an unavoidable corner. He asked whether asylum is a lawful pathway into the United States. Noem attempted evasions, but the answer was indisputable. As Goldman pressed, he made clear that deporting people with active asylum applications is unlawful. Noem avoided the question by pivoting to Joe Biden, the border, anything but the issue in front of her. Goldman cut through it. “Why are you filibustering? Why can’t you answer the question?”
She could not, because the truth was unavoidable. The Trump administration has been deporting people who are in the country lawfully under U.S. asylum statutes.
When Noem abruptly claimed she had to leave the hearing early for a FEMA Review Council meeting, Democrats, including Representative Jared Moskowitz of Florida, quickly confirmed the meeting had already been canceled. In other words, she lied. As she walked out, she was heckled by attendees in the chamber.
And this hearing was not an isolated moment. Down the hall, Congressman Bennie Thompson confronted an FBI official who claimed Antifa was the country’s top domestic threat. Thompson asked basic questions: where is Antifa headquartered, how many members does it have, what does its organizational structure look like. The official could not answer a single one. Thompson’s point landed. The threat was invented for political theater, not public safety.
The Trump administration’s immigration regime is not a system of law and order. It is a system of political retribution, fear mongering, and human suffering. It targets veterans, longtime residents, asylum seekers, peaceful protesters, and even American musicians and other artists who refuse to let their work be used for propaganda.
Now the responsibility shifts to all of us to remain vigilant, to amplify these moments of accountability, and to insist on a government that recognizes humanity before cruelty, truth before propaganda, and the rule of law before the whims of a lawless administration.
Before I go, here are a few other stories we are tracking at the MeidasTouch Network:
A federal judge has ordered the immediate release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia from ICE detention.
Epstein survivors and Senate Democrats are calling for an audit to determine whether the Trump administration tampered with Epstein files ahead of their release.
The Indiana State Senate is set to vote on redistricting today, and Trump is threatening the state if Republicans don’t do what he wants.
He says if the Senate doesn’t pass his preferred map, he will strip all federal funding from Indiana. (The U.S. government is now operating like the mob.)
In Ohio, Democrat Amy Acton is surging. A new Emerson poll shows her gaining 7 points and overtaking Republican Vivek Ramaswamy for the first time.
Hundreds are quarantined in South Carolina amid a historic measles outbreak linked to a drastic drop in vaccinations combined with holiday travel.
Trump’s former criminal defense attorney turned federal judge Emil Bove now faces a potential ethics investigation after attending Trump’s Pennsylvania rally.
The Democratic bill to extend Affordable Care Act subsidies for three years failed to reach 60 votes in the Senate — only four GOP senators supported it.
Thanks for reading and watching my mid-day update. Ron Filipkowski will publish his comprehensive news bulletin of all the day’s top stories later today, so stay tuned!
